Molly (1/10)

Chapter 22

"Please...please don't hurt me..."

She felt her legs rising from the ground and now looked upon a giant, and if there was anything past dread Kathy was there now, struggling to break free of a murder-grip.

"See?" the sheep-woman said. "If we breed with them, we will become like them. If we live like them, we will become like them. And if we use their toys, we will die like them, for here is the singular cause of their destruction."

The sheep-man set Kathy down and lifted her wrist, hand stretching around her watch. Kathy screamed, then heard a crunch. For a brief moment she thought that pain was coming; instead: nothing, besides a small pinch as she was lowered, her watch falling to the ground and flickering dead.

The sheep-man smiled wickedly. "Now, you are free."

The sheep-woman stepped in front of him and Kathy.

"That's enough Hurn."

"Protecting your own, Yolanda?" Hurn said, mockingly.

"You can eat her for all I care. But she was with her. Maybe we can learn more about the little snake. "

Hurn scowled. "You talk like a pastor, or a general! These are the twin scopes, or have you already forgotten what was laid bare on Holy Mountain?"

"I have seen the scrawl and will not forget it."

Hurn went over and spit on the ground in front of Kathy. She flinched, still so afraid she could only barely process what was happening.

"They are for bargaining," Yolanda said. "That's it."

"So practical, but I wonder if you're not hiding something? Some feminine sensibility, to protect, like a mother protecting her cub."

Kathy noticed that the other men in sheepskin were staring, as if waiting for something.

Yolanda rolled her eyes then waved the back of her hand at Hurn. "Kill me or don't, Hurn. I'm done fighting with you."

Hurn sniffed the air. Then: one step, coming ever-closer to Kathy.

"We don't need both of them."

Kathy's heart stopped.

Yolanda glanced at her, then Chase. She made her way to the edge of the circle, considering Chase and Kathy again in turn. Hurn waited, that same awful smile on his face.

Kathy sobbed as Yolanda went to Chase and motioned for two of her counterparts to lift him up.

"See?" Hurn said. "Just need a little show of faith."

"Hurry up," Yolanda snapped. "We have to go."

Hurn snorted, then reached and took out a gun with vines twisting around the barrel, shooting Chase where he lay.

"Chase!"

Now her vision did fade, and as she fell to the ground pain reached inside her belly and tore her apart.

In her dream, Kathy was waiting at the end of a table. A door opened. A man appeared, dressed in black. He sat across from her and crossed his fingers.

"You were never good enough."

A sullen sky, a twisted sun. Kathy stared up a long wire approaching what could only be the station. The fires were still on. It seemed as if those in the clouds had been spared this apocalypse.

She was hovering above the ground, hands bound by wire, cutting into her wrists. Blood had trickled down her arms and to her legs. She was being held up by some wooden contraption, not a cross but similar, with three arms and what looked to be bramble cushioning Kathy from having to lay directly against the wood. The sheep-people were here, waiting, looking up and watching the station.